


just after dawn.

by DictionaryWrites



Series: Patrician & Clerk [7]
Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Sharing a Bed, Sleeping Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-01
Updated: 2019-02-01
Packaged: 2019-10-20 12:24:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17622335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: In the quiet of the morning, Vetinari smiles.





	just after dawn.

Vetinari’s eyes open.

It is a little after dawn, he surmises based on the distant peal of the bell in the Tower of Art, and he can hear some of the servants in the corridors, the planks of the hardwood floors shifting beneath their light feet as they begin to light the candles for the day. It is warm, in Vetinari’s bedroom – this is as a result of its being enfolded away from the draughts of the halls, reachable only via secreted tunnels within the walls of the Palace, and the warmth that gathers here _lingers_.

Of course, there is another aspect.

Vetinari turns his head on the pillow, and he looks at Drumknott. His jaw is slack in sleep, his eyes loosely closed, and his hair is a mess, the fringe curtaining his face and lingering over his eyes instead of where it usually is, coiffed neatly back from his face with a perfectly perpendicular parting on the lefthand side.

Drumknott, in the two hours that Vetinari has been sleeping beside him, has managed to insinuate underneath Vetinari’s arm, that his chin[1] can better be jabbed into the flesh of Vetinari’s pectoral muscles, and that his ear[2] might be pressed more bodily against the flat of Vetinari’s chest. Drumknott’s body is pressed tightly against Vetinari’s left side[3], and his left arm is hooked over Vetinari’s belly, his fingers loosely knotted in the under sheet. His right arm is crammed awkwardly against his own body to better facilitate the position he has twisted himself into, and despite how ridiculous the position is, moulded as he is against the hard, angular planes of the Patrician’s body, he is sleeping soundly.

Vetinari can feel his heartbeat when his fingers linger over his neck, slow and even, and he can feel Drumknott’s regular breathing, the noise he occasionally releases on an exhale too soft and polite to be called a snore. _Real_ snoring can be heard from Mr Fusspot, who has managed to worm his way under the sheets, and is curled in a tight ball between Vetinari’s ankles, but even that is not so bad as Wuffles once had been. _Wuffles_ had snored like a hurricane, and Vetinari had always found the noise relatively comforting, a background drone, and had scarcely noticed it until he had become used to Drumknott sharing his bed, and arguing with the dog[4] every morning.

In the quiet of the morning, Vetinari sighs with quiet satisfaction.

A few hours ago, as he does every night[5], and has for years now, he had slipped into bed with Drumknott and Mr Fusspot, and Drumknott hadn’t shown any sign of being disturbed. He doesn’t have an issue with falling asleep with Lord Vetinari’s candle still lit, nor with Vetinari working at his desk and making notes or turning pages in the room beside him – if anything, the sound of Vetinari’s pen scratching against parchment, or the sound of parchment shifting as it’s turned over, seems to have on Drumknott the gently soporific effect sailors attribute to the sounds of the sea. When Vetinari moves into bed beside him to sleep the two hours or so he sees fit to take, in contrast to Drumknott, who requires six or seven to remain hale and hearty, he never wakes or complains, but will come closer, will seek out what body heat of Vetinari’s he might leech away – Drumknott would never steal a paperclip or a pencil, but he is more than willing to share in his hard-earned warmth, if it’s there for the taking.

Vetinari reaches over, and he draws some of the errant hair away from Drumknott’s face, baring his brow. Drumknott doesn’t move. In the privacy of the moment, Vetinari allows himself a small, affectionate smile.

Thus begins the careful process of his extrication: first, the arm strung over his belly is set on Drumknott’s own thigh; second, Vetinari’s feet are carefully taken from where they are pinned between Mr Fusspot’s body and Drumknott’s tangled half of the bedsheet[6]; thirdly, Drumknott’s head is neatly grasped by the hair, and as Vetinari moves to sit up, he lets Drumknott’s cheek come down against the pillow instead; fourth and finally, Vetinari’s feet slip into the slippers waiting for him beside the bed, in parallel to Drumknott’s own, and he stands to reach for his dressing gown.

Behind him, easily manipulated by the easy practice and perfect grace of Vetinari’s movements, Drumknott’s sleep goes on, uninterrupted. In thirty minutes or so, at five-thirty precisely, aided by the uncanny rhythm of the secretary’s internal clock, he will rise, and the two of them will take on the day’s schedule together.

 

[1] Which is uncomfortably square and angular, a jut of bone more lethal than most other blunt instruments in the Oblong Office.

[2] Which is small and with a delicate curve to the shell, but is extraordinarily keen.

[3] The bed, which is against the wall, always hosts Vetinari on the righthand side – the outside, meaning that Drumknott is ordinarily between Vetinari and the wall. Drumknott had once admitted, in the aftermath of a particularly violent incident, that he found this rather comforting.

[4] Quite respectfully, and with all due approbation.

[5] Or, more accurately, every early morning.

[6] Drumknott, who is nearly a foot shorter than Vetinari, ordinarily manages in the course of the night to knot and snarl the quarter of thick blanket he does not need to cover his body about his and Vetinari’s feet. How he manages this is a complete mystery, and may perhaps be attributed to the private humours of the likes of the goddess Pedestriana.

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up [on Dreamwidth](https://dictionarywrites.dreamwidth.org/2287.html). Requests always open. Please hit me up on Dreamwidth or Discord if you'd like to talk more about this ship, honestly - I'm really excited about it and would love to find some other shippers. 
> 
> I run a [Discworld Comm](https://onthedisc.dreamwidth.org/), and there's also [a Discord right here.](https://discord.gg/b8Z3ThH)


End file.
